In College and Hiding from Scary Ideas • Hacker News Board

Re: In College and Hiding from Scary Ideas

#91

Post by WalterSear » Sun, Mar 22, 2015, 3:02 PM UTC

throwaway9324 wrote: post #69

This is a pretty bad opinion piece using scare quotes, personal attacks and anecdotal commentary. It's disappointing to see this up-voted since people here aren't interested in a debate, but just to affirming there own views on the subject. I pretty glad I got out of the mainstream tech industry when I had the chance. Edit: And yes please reaffirm what cowards you are by down-voting instead of replying.

    Edit: And yes please reaffirm what cowards you are
    by down-voting instead of replying.

This part:

    This is a pretty bad opinion piece using scare quotes,
    personal attacks and anecdotal commentary.

And this part:

    It's disappointing to see this up-voted since people
    here aren't interested in a debate, but just to       
    affirming there own views on the subject.

And some people are probably downvoting the vindictiveness and prejudice you hold and make evident in this part:

    I pretty glad I got out of the mainstream tech industry when I had the chance.

And maybe some are downvoting the prejudice and spite you demonstrate overall. Hope your day gets better.

Re: In College and Hiding from Scary Ideas

#92

Post by jqm » Sun, Mar 22, 2015, 3:04 PM UTC

fennecfoxen wrote: post #64

Alex3917 wrote: post #57

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The fear is that the current leftist ideas are tomorrow's mainstream ideas and tomorrow's left will be more extreme. I see a lot of evidence on the right but not much on the left. E.g. The people saying they support gays but are against gay marriage are the same ones helping African governments pass laws enacting the death penalty for homosexuality. But I don't really see any evidence that, say, what the folks lobb…

> The people saying they support gays but are against gay marriage are the same ones helping African governments pass laws enacting the death penalty for homosexuality. I'm curious what this alleged political process actually looks like -- are people writing checks to re-elect Robert Mugabe? -- and the extent to which "people saying they support gays [etc]" here in America actually are participate in that sort of pro…

"praise from both the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.."

Who, in my opinion, are simply trying to recover from the political damage cause by the California prop 8 fiasco.

Re: In College and Hiding from Scary Ideas

#93

Post by guscost » Sun, Mar 22, 2015, 3:08 PM UTC

eli_gottlieb wrote: post #74

Alex3917 wrote: post #57

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The fear is that the current leftist ideas are tomorrow's mainstream ideas and tomorrow's left will be more extreme. I see a lot of evidence on the right but not much on the left. E.g. The people saying they support gays but are against gay marriage are the same ones helping African governments pass laws enacting the death penalty for homosexuality. But I don't really see any evidence that, say, what the folks lobb…

Also, if the Left always gets more left-wing over time, while the mainstream always moves leftward, leaving nobody but a lone batch of online hyper-reactionaries defending decency and normality, where's my Communism? Worker-owned cooperatives? Commons trusts? Basic income? Only the last of those is even under the remotest mainstream consideration! And how is it that we've got the most hegemonically capitalist system…

The World: 8000 BC - 2014 AD. Died of Global Warming.

But seriously, I don't agree with the choice to label our recent history a "leftward" movement. I would call it a gradual, and thus far successful evolution. It often includes progressive ideas spreading through society, but as the author correctly points out, many progressive ideas are never accepted (see eugenics).

I think the best way to explain it is to say that while the "conservative" side of our culture tends to favor stagnation, the "liberal" side of our culture tends to favor unchecked growth. On the one hand, it would be very unfortunate if our society stagnated for centuries like some have, but on the other hand unchecked growth is what cancer does, and that's not healthy either.

Re: In College and Hiding from Scary Ideas

#94

Post by gd1 » Sun, Mar 22, 2015, 3:08 PM UTC

Negitivefrags wrote: post #19

The more I see this kind of thing the more I am starting to fear that this is an unintended consequence of the internet. Similarly to being raised in a cult, the internet gives people the ability to spend most of their time in a community that reinforces their world view while forcing out any dissenting view points. Subcultures on the internet tend to trend towards the more and more extreme as anybody expressing an o…

You can see it in action on Hacker News, or any sites with downvotes. Inevitably, the downvoting will destabilise any equilibrium - the views of even a slight majority will get reinforced in a positive feedback loop, and you end up with an echo chamber. There are several opinions that I know can't be voiced here.

Re: In College and Hiding from Scary Ideas

#95

Post by analog31 » Sun, Mar 22, 2015, 3:13 PM UTC

tunesmith wrote: post #18

littletimmy wrote: post #11

This is the end result of a culture that treats children like dainty chinadolls that are going to shatter at the first fracture. These kids are coddled since they are born to make sure they are "safe" and ferried endlessly from one constructive activity to another so they don't take any risk. Of course it will also be that they need "safe spaces" in college (basically extended high school) whenever they hear somethin…

I've always rolled my eyes at complaints about the "trophy generation" (Adam Carolla had a particularly brain-deadening rant about it), but this article honestly did get me wondering about how people like that would be able to cope with actual professional atmospheres after college. On the other hand, this article is an editorial that doesn't really try to quantify the problem, so maybe "people like that" aren't real…

An amusing anecdote about the "trophy generation." There is a tradition of not keeping score at soccer games for little kids. My kids were in these soccer leagues for a while, so I attended quite a number of games.

The adults didn't keep score. Whether they knew the score or not depended on whether they cared about sports or not.

The kids kept score. At the end of the game, every last kid knew the score, who won, who kicked the most goals, had the most saves, etc.

Likewise with "every kid gets a ribbon." The kids know the score. They know if it's one of those ribbons that every kid gets, or a ribbon that's actually a prize for something.

Re: In College and Hiding from Scary Ideas

#96

Post by JohnBooty » Sun, Mar 22, 2015, 3:25 PM UTC

ZenoArrow wrote: post #14

tunesmith wrote: post #8

It wasn't so long ago that "trigger warning" wasn't even a common phrase. I remember thinking about this in college, though, because I was in a relationship with someone who would get angry at people for expressing input that was too closely related to recent private trauma she had been through. I didn't really understand it because I had always trained myself to judge the producer of input by the intent of the produ…

> "I had always trained myself to judge the producer of input by the intent of the producer, rather than by how it affected me" Then I applaud you, as that is a vital skill, rarely understood. So much miscommunication happens because content is easier to follow than intent, yet understanding intent is what really lets you get to know someone.

Judging somebody's intent is great - but consider how much better it works on some scales than others.

Suppose you and I are close friends. We've known each other for years. We understand each others' intents pretty well. Last year I totally forgot your birthday - and you didn't get mad, because you know I was busy with a family emergency and my intent wasn't to make you feel like crap. Similarly, sometimes you make extremely tasteless jokes: jokes about murder or maybe even racial issues. I laugh at them because I have a similar sense of humor and I understand your intent very well: I know you're a caring human being and they're just jokes, for crying out loud.

And that's how friendships are supposed to work. We understand each other and don't get bothered over the small stuff.

But how well does that work with people that don't know each other well? A heck of a lot less well. You can't possibly know everybody's intents. The guy on the bus? The guy handing out leaflets? The loudmouth in your university lecture hall?

I used to joke about a lot of things that I don't joke about any more, at least in public. In my mind when I made those jokes, I was actually parodying the kinds of people who earnestly believed really shitty things. But to people that didn't know me well, I was at times indistinguishable from the actual bad guys. I felt I had a choice: be more selective with my humor, or hide behind the old "but my intentions were good!!!!!" excuse.

Re: In College and Hiding from Scary Ideas

#97

Post by cauterized » Sun, Mar 22, 2015, 3:27 PM UTC

People can be thrown into paralysis or panic by PTSD. Giving a warning that something is about to be discussed in depth that might trigger such an attack, allowing someone who knows they would experience one to absent themselves while the lecture or discussion continues, isn't censorship. It's courtesy.

Re: In College and Hiding from Scary Ideas

#98

Post by [deleted] » Sun, Mar 22, 2015, 3:27 PM UTC

tomjen3 wrote: post #50

>The room was equipped with cookies, coloring books, bubbles, Play-Doh, calming music, pillows, blankets and a video of frolicking puppies That is something you would expect to find in a young childs room. Is that really the state they are at? And also, what is wrong with a real puppy?

[deleted]

Re: In College and Hiding from Scary Ideas

#99

Post by blumkvist » Sun, Mar 22, 2015, 3:29 PM UTC

JohnBooty wrote: post #90

blumkvist wrote: post #40

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Great comments, yours and the "parent's". Very eloquently put. I have had problems with people thinking I'm arguing or attacking their ideas, when I am only looking for a debate and a more thorough view of their ideas and line of thinking. This forced me to rethink my communication skills and try to change my approach of conversing. I've found that people who understand those concepts can use them to their advantage…

> I have had problems with people thinking I'm arguing or > attacking their ideas, when I am only looking for a > debate and a more thorough view of their ideas and > line of thinking. Noble intent, poor execution. Consider that people in oppressed groups (women, victims of sexual assault, ethnic minorities) have had their legitimacy questioned and denied throughout most if not all of history. And then along comes yo…

Well, I'm making conscious effort to improve, but to be fair I never did quite go so far as to question obviously disturbed people. What I describe is more in line with a heated discussion of politics or history.

In any case, this lead to micro conflicts I wasn't aware of and so poor relationships.

Your solution is spot-on. I had such difficulty following through, that I literary tied up a piece of red string on my left wrist to remind me of conflicts and my unmindfulness. Nowadays the Internet is my battleground for heated debate :)

Re: In College and Hiding from Scary Ideas

#100

Post by Alex3917 » Sun, Mar 22, 2015, 3:32 PM UTC

fennecfoxen wrote: post #80

Alex3917 wrote: post #68

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> are people writing checks to re-elect Robert Mugabe? http://www.huffingtonpost.com/james-peron/whos-helping-finan... > Also, way to go easy on the left. I mean if you actually read DailyKos or whatever it's clear that a lot of the people there are batshit crazy. But as far as I can tell it's one level of crazy, I'm sure there are exceptions but for the vast majority of people I don't think it goes 10 levels deep. W…

According to this piece: (a) Miscellaneous fundamentalist elements of the Christian right who clearly don't support gays have been doing miscellaneous agitation through their missionary arms; African churches have been lobbied (in the passive voice) "to drop ties with mainstream Christian groups." I'm not sure who these shadowy figures are, but it sounds like they're not mainstream. (b) Everyone is helping support th…

> I'm not sure who these shadowy figures are, but it sounds like they're not mainstream.

My understanding is that they are actually quite mainstream:

http://www.npr.org/templates/transcript/transcript.php?story...

E.g. they include several prominent senators and congressman. I'll admit that I don't know for a fact that the exact same people have said they support gay people, but I still think my comment is valid because that's basically the right-wing party line and these are folks at the very top of the Republican party.

Again I'm not saying that if the left had a monopoly on politics that they wouldn't do a terrible job, only that I think they have less of a propensity to say they want X when really what they want is Y.

E.g. when they say they want to reduce greenhouse gas emissions by 80% because that's what climatologists say is necessary to prevent runaway climate change, I don't get the feeling that what they really want is to reduce greenhouse gas emissions by 100%.